Ghost In My Shell
by lyrically
Summary: Reuploaded! Hermione reflects upon her god of perfection.


Introduction:  
We are thrown in the dark when it comes to the question of whether or not our Malfoy god is a gentle lover. Is he? My theoretical take on this because canon makes me shudder.

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**GHOST IN MY SHELL  
**_**Sciovolare**_

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The vanity mirror taunts her. There is a desperate need to look at herself, to see what faults taint her skin. She asks the same questions _his_ mother used to do in the same situation--she would look into her Romanesque mirror, a special antique, and would ask herself where the black and blue marrings would appear. The girl who sits in front of that mirror now is repeating history.

Would it be black? Or blue?

Would her skin be covered in welts?

Would there be red, just red?

Oh, there were many reasons why she would find new markings on her skin. At first, she blamed it on the rough sex, which he liked, and that was the cause of the pain in her arms and legs and stomach. That whenever she tried to walk or reach high to grab a book in the library, her limbs would ache something terrible. She concluded at one point that, yes, it was sex.

Now, however, it seemed that sex was just an excuse for him.

He liked to touch. His touches were rough, hard. His touches were far from the wondrous caresses of a passionate lover, were far from velvet, despite his fondness for the material.

He found an excuse, any excuse, just to hit her.

Every day.

Every single day.

Every single fucking day.

_'Why did you marry him?'_ was everyone's grand question.

She would laugh bitterly and reply, _'I didn't marry him, heavens no. Malfoy courted me and foolish me, I responded in kind not knowing it had been a courting to begin with.'_

Then they would ask, _'Can you not break the marriage?'_

She would shake her head. _'No, because I, Hermione Granger-Malfoy, am bound to him.'_

Reflecting those yesterdays made her smile cruelly, more at herself than anything else.

It was a slow courting. He had pursued her, hypnotised her into loving him with books and flowers and kisses during midnight. Then, they had sex. She should have known--being the _smart_, _intelligent_ witch that she was--that there was something odd that night. That performing _blood_ rituals before pre-coitus was anything but normal.

But, blinded by love, she ignored it.

She allowed herself to sink on his silk sheets and allowed him to worship her body for what it was. She let him debauch her in every way possible. She abandoned herself to his ministrations, let herself go wild in the night. She remembered how he slipped inside her wet heat with an agonizing slowness, letting her adjust to his intrusion. Then, he had started moving--in, out, in--and she was far into the stars before she could even scream his name.

That had been her mistake--giving herself to him. Because as the months went by, she noticed that he would hit her, that everything she did seemed _wrong_, and he felt it right that he should punish her using his once-gentle hands.

At one point, she really thought she did wrong. But soon, she realised that it wasn't her fault. That his father had been an influence on him. Lucius had been his god of all gods, despite Voldemort. That power _did _have meaning. That it wasn't money that made the world go round but absolute power.

She remembered the sombre day she entered the Malfoy Manor. It really wasn't the dark atmosphere that shocked her, nor was it the portraits that glared at her and made promises to kill her. What shook her was the lady of the house, Narcissa Malfoy.

The woman, known for her arrogance, had looked at her in sympathy.

She had not realised it then, but now she knew. Now, as she looked into the mirror, inspecting the bruises and cuts that decorated her arms and legs (never her face), she realised her grave, grave mistake.

Hermione Granger had given her soul to the devil, and all he ever left her was her ghost of yester-years.

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_**Author's Note:**  
I would have fleshed out more on the gory details of domestic violence indicated in this story, but I found it really unnecessary._


End file.
